Coming to the end of the wedding season last year, I had learned a lot of things after working with so many couples. The lessons were not over until Caeli and Jordan's wedding, the last of 2012. Before I started photographing weddings, I had only ever attended one wedding as a little 7 year old ring-bearer. For another 13 years I would never experience a wedding fully until I had the chance to shoot Jordan and Caeli's wedding. What I mean by this is that there are far more layers to a wedding than even a photographer can comprehend in one day shooting.

Jordan was kind enough to invite me to his stag on Friday, two days before the Wedding (phewww). My assistant Grady and I arrived in Kelowna at our hotel and went straight to the party. It's the first stag I've ever attended, and I won't lie... it lived up to everything I envisioned a stag to be like. Perhaps even better than my expectations. In the end, the men were all OK. Jordan never suffered a black eye, no one went missing, and after a few phone calls to find out how the girls stagette was going, it seemed like they were just fine too. The weekend could proceed with no hiccups.

The next day was devoted to family and friends a food and drinks. It's the side of a wedding I've never been a part of, and I'm so glad that I had the opportunity to experience. With the amazing Kelowna weather it turned out to be a quite the afternoon. Here I got to know a lot about family and how weddings really bring people together. Having lived in Canada with only my parents and siblings, family occasions are always quite small. Perhaps this is why the event struck me as something so special.

Finally, the third day was wedding day. At this point I was already entirely thrilled that my last wedding of the year was such an incredible experience. It only got better. Caeli and Jordan decided to do a first look, which meant an earlier start time for both the men and woman, and Grady and I. Usually the morning is where I get to know the wedding party and family, but since I had already had crazy adventures with the guys, and met all the girls and family the day before, I was on a first name basis with most people. From then on, one of the smoothest, most thrilling and longest celebrations went on.

I really cannot thank Jordan and Caeli enough for inviting me into their lives so fully. It really got me very excited to start up the season this year. As for the wedding day, I'll leave the rest of the story for you to see through the photographs.